A Wayne State University School of Medicine student captured a first place award for Clinical Research at the American College of Surgeons Clinical Congress held last month in San Diego.

Diana Kakos, a second-year medical student, won the ACS Clinical Congress Medical Student Program Poster Session for "Aesthetic Comparison Between Subcuticular Suture and Staple Closure of Anterior Cervical Spine (ACS) Incision Scars: A Prospective Controlled Single-Blinded Clinical Trial."

"I am honored and humbled to receive this distinction from among the many deserving medical students who presented their research," said Kakos, of Bloomfield Hills, Mich. "I am so grateful to my mentors, Dr. Sina Rajamand, Dr. Doris Tong and Dr. Teck Soo, as well as the Wayne State University School of Medicine community, for the support I received in pursuing this endeavor. It was inspiring to interact with so many innovative medical students and physicians from all over the country and world."

Anterior cervical spine procedures make up a significant portion of the clinical caseloads of neurosurgeons and orthopedic spine surgeons, she explained. Any procedure of the head and neck will have greater scrutiny of scar appearance, as it will be readily apparent to the patient and observers for the rest of their lives. Closure of the postoperative incision can be performed in many ways. "Our study sought to objectively compare subcuticular suture closure with staple closure as related to postoperative aesthetic appearance. We found that staples and sutures provide equivalent aesthetic outcomes per evaluation by a plastic surgeon, using a validated outcome measure," Kakos said. "This study gives aesthetic outcome of closure technique objectivity and allows the surgeon to choose his or her technique of closure with confidence in equivalency of aesthetic outcome."

Kakos, who is not yet sure what field of medicine she wants to enter after graduation, also presented the research during the WSU School of Medicine Student Research Symposium, but her presentation at the Congress was the first time she presented the final results and analysis.